The Fall of EU Roaming Costs

The EU has been working hard to reduce the cost of roaming throughout Europe, it is now the cheapest it’s ever been, however it is still not cheap enough.

In 2013 the European Commission proposed to abolish roaming charges by December 2015. In January 2015 a proposal was made to delay this until mid-2018.

The EC’s Anndrus Ansip, the European Commission’s vice-president for the digital single market, recently attacked governments across Europe for being unsupportive in abolishing roaming fees, calling the current compromise “a joke” at a European Voice Event held in Brussels.

As of May 2015, the latest leaked proposal would give users up to 100MB of data, 100 minutes of calls, and 50 texts at domestic rates while roaming, per year. Any roaming charges thereafter would not be allowed to exceed the EU limits for inter-operator wholesale prices, which for data is €0.05 per MB. Under this proposal 1GB of data would cost around €50.

Businesses are using more and more data to keep connected overseas, so even with the current EU rates don’t assume bill shock is a thing of the past just yet.

Luckily, Cellhire’s unique partnerships and global position allow us to offer big data bundles from less than 1p per MB, even in the EU.